The 10 Most Misunderstood Wii Games: Conclusion

The 10 Most Misunderstood Wii Games: Conclusion

by Mike D.

I am a part of the part that at first was all, part of the darkness that gave birth to light, that supercilious light which now disputes with mother night her ancient rank and space, and yet cannot succeed.
-Goethe\’s Faust (as translated by Carlyle F. McIntyre)

1.) Metroid: Other M

It helps if you start by forgetting.

Forget everything you think you know about 3D game design. Forget manual cameras, Z-targeting and analog sticks. And you may as well forget about genre classifications, too.

Metroid: Other M is a game from the future that doubled back through the past en route to the present. It is the only beast of its kind, and for good reason – it shouldn\’t work at all.

Why? Because it\’s a sidescroller. And a standard behind-the-back, third-person 3D action game. And a platformer, first-person shooter, melee-brawler, pixel-hunting detective game. Sometimes the view is reversed, and you\’re running toward the screen. Other times it takes on an isometric perspective. On paper, this shouldn\’t work at all. But it does. This shape-shifting, perspective-switching minx more than works. In fact, it seems that the template created by Project M was so seamless that many didn\’t notice its genre-busting, avant-garde ethos. This game takes a scalpel to Mario 64 and Ocarina of Time, removing their established 3D game design orthodoxy and replacing it with a vision of what games may have felt like if they didn\’t leave behind so much of their 2D heritage.

It\’s worth noting that this Metroid is so misunderstood that it isn\’t uncommon to see comments about it actually being 2D or 2.5D. It is not. It is a fully 3D game, but one that utilizes conventions of the past: digital controls for snappy movement and an auto-camera that sometimes frames the action as a sidescrolling platformer. The controls and camera can, at times, suggest an NES game, albeit one grafted into present day, not bound to a 2D rail.

Odds are, if you had read the ravenous hyperbole that descended upon Other M when it launched, this sounds like Greek. How can a 3D game really be any good without analog control, or without a lock-on? Again, it helps if you start by forgetting. Forget those conventions. This game was designed around its control limitations. Everything from its method of dodging enemy attacks, to shooting enemies (which takes on the arcade-y feel of Super Metroid), to its method of navigating twisting rooms (via synced camera movement), was molded around the strengths of the controls.

Project M built this game with 8 directions of movement in mind, because who the hell said analog control fit every game?
This game was built to feel like a modern-day interpretation of an NES game, because who said those titles aren\’t worth imitating as much as Grand Theft Auto 3?

If you\’ve read this far, intrepid reader, I firstly thank you. Secondly, this is about to get ugly. We\’ve covered controversial (and misunderstood) game mechanics up until now, but there is something even more divisive about this game: the murky territory of Samus Aran\’s character portrayal. However, before diving in, it\’s worth noting that the beloved badass of games past didn\’t disappear. Does this Samus look emo to you?

I thought not.

And I assure you, this bounty hunter didn\’t destroy your childhood, \”kill Samus,\” raze the Metroid series to the ground (it is selling on par with the rest of the series; even though it received price drops, it enjoyed no \”Player\’s Choice\” release like Prime or Echoes) or arrive from out of nowhere. She existed in Metroid Fusion, which was quite well received and introduced a more internally thoughtful Samus to the fore (it is also worth noting that Samus sharing her thoughts with us literally introduces the classic Super Metroid). There is more revealed of her past in Other M; her most regrettable actions and mistakes appear in flashbacks. Yes, Ms. Aran made mistakes as a youth. Didn\’t you?

So, if we allow her the same awkward youthful indiscretions that are the common currency of adolescence, what is left? Ah, yes. The charges of sexism – Samus takes orders from a man, cries, and later appears frightened by the sudden appearance of Ridley. So lets unpack these, shall we? Off the top, the tears are shed for losing the closest thing she has to family left in her life. Try losing your father figure without your face becoming a mask of anguish. This is the most callow of criticisms one can make.

Onto the chain of command, then. The man giving orders here qualifies as Samus\’ commanding officer in a military operation. Although obscured elsewhere in the early plot, the point of this entire exercise is to look for survivors. The commanding officer simply gets to decide where to look, and thus where Samus searches, which doesn\’t sound nearly as malevolent as the vitriol spewed upon this plot development. There is one instance – one – in which said plot device falters. This is, of course, the dreaded \”hell run\” partaken in Sector 3 of the Bottle Ship. From the perspective of the narrative, it sucks. But gameplay? It provides one of the tensest moments of the entire game. Panic, mistime a jump or dodge, and you\’ve died. It is a trade-off between action and story. Perhaps there was a more elegant way of approaching it, but this is hardly game breaking. It is a mild annoyance conquered in under 5 minutes in a game that can easily last 15 hours or more on a first play through. Perspective makes a laughingstock of this.

That leaves us with Ridley.

\”But Samus beat him so many times before!\” Yes, indeed. But a timeline definitively solves this one. Again, it helps if you start by forgetting. Odds are, the Prime series is most fresh in your memory, but forget them. They happened long ago in the Metroid mythos, sandwiched as a side-story set in between the original Metroid and its direct sequel, Return of Samus. Other M takes place in the aftermath of the SNES masterwork, Super Metroid. This is pertinent, because Super really is the turning point of the overall series narrative. Mother Brain dies, Ridley dies, the last Metroids in existence die, and the planet of Zebes itself dies. Samus takes ample time to reflect on this at the outset of Other M, pondering about the infant Metroid that saved her and the death of her \”long-standing nemesis, Ridley.\” Yes, her tormentor is finally gone.

No, really. Gone. As explained later in Other M\’s plot, the Ridley that appears in the Pyrosphere was not actually Ridley. It was a genetic clone, unwittingly created by Galactic Federation scientists who had taken samples of materials (including dragon goop, it turns out) on Samus\’ armor as she lay convalescing after the destruction of Zebes at the end of Super Metroid. This is the reason for Samus\’ frozen surprise: she was seeing a ghost. She had finally destroyed this reptilian Mephistopheles, and saw to the blowing up of the planet on which his corpse resided. And yet he seemingly appears again. Whole. Hale. What would your reaction be, to seeing the dead rise?

Of course, I realize we\’re simply talking about a videogame here. And this effort would not even be necessary, were it not for a portion of the gaming media that collectively lost its mind when this game released.

I have never had qualms with those that just didn\’t like this game (it definitely has flaws, which we\’ll discuss later). Or any game, really. My ire is directed at those who have been so purposefully obtuse and so certain of their outrage that they didn\’t bother to look at silly things like context. Or an overall picture. Or of sheer bloody variety and risk and verve.

Other M\’s lineage traces to the darkness that gave birth to the light of the Metroid series. It disputes the notion of what a Metroid game can be, and of what a 3D game needs to be. I suppose it is understandable that it is misunderstood by some. But there is something here worth appreciating on its own terms, I think. Maybe you do, too.

Grit your teeth and get through it like I did when the NES came out. It's a great game and when you get past something you get the feeling of accomplishment that is rather rare in gaming today. AC, COD, and all the other large franchises don't challenge the player anymore and if they do it isn't because it is challenging it is because they are cheap. My main point being made with COD World at War in the most challenging mode (can't remember what it's called) pretty much just has your enemies lob grenades at you through the entire campaign. So the AI isn't improved or anything actually challenging, essentially you just have to run out guns blazing and cross your fingers.

I have to disagree. Other M is a game of good intentions but very poor execution.
As a game designer myself, one of the lessons I was taught is that the Metroid series used to thrive on empowering the player. You start off weak and through your own skill, intellect, and courage acquire powers and abilities that turn former threats and obstacles into easily-conquered solutions.
Other M VIOLATES this basic rule of game design. The "authorization" technique used by Adam is a prohibitive decision that completely neuters Samus's powers for an utterly arbitrary reason. The player does not "earn" their success and power; they are "allowed" to use the powers they already have by some unlikeable military clod that we don't even know.
And there is a narrative problem, and it's a big one. The game fails to be a good story. Put aside your preconceived notions of "what Samus should be" and take it on its own merits, as a new game for new players, and we are left with a very poor, underdeveloped story.
We never explore Samus's past, upbringing, or personality, really. Her adoptive parents, the Chozo, are never even MENTIONED, yet she says "Adam was like a father to her". She already HAD father figures growing up. She was an ADULT WOMAN when she MET Adam.
But let's look at Adam. All we know about Adam are two things: what Samus says he is, and what the game SHOWS he is. And the game shows him to be a mean, distrusting, petty, dimwitted, poor leader who puts his crew in unnecessary danger, limits their abilities, makes them run through fire without permitting them to turn on their shields, and he ultimately gets nearly everyone killed (and he gets people killed in the past too). Why does Samus respect him? She has saved the galaxy at this point over a half-dozen times! She has defeated Mother Brain twice, Ridley four times, Kraid twice, Dark Samus twice, Emperor Ing, Metroid Prime, and the Metroid Queen... what has Adam done? Nothing, really.
So why is Samus treated like a kid running with scissors. She's a professional. She's a savior. Adam acts like a petulant child with a grudge and goes out of his way to do her harm, both verbally (he talks down to her) and ultimately physically (his last scene involves him literally shooting her in the back... instead of, you know, asking her to stop).
We never get to like Adam. It follows the horrid Star Wars prequel story structure of telling us what to feel instead of showing us why we should care. Samus talks for hours but says very little.
The defining moment of hatred for me was not the Ridley scene (which was infuriating) or Samus getting shot in the back (which was enraging) or Samus being bullied by a fat officer and intimated into submission at the end of the game (which was disgusting), but rather a moment where Samus states, as if it is her own opinion, that "life should not be tampered with"... and then says "that's what Adam used to say", depriving us of an opinion of her OWN. That also is insanely hypocritical of her since she, Samus, is an unnaturally altered human being spliced with half-Chozo alien DNA and is, by Adam's own account, a life that has been "tampered" with. That is such hypocrisy that I refuse to believe Samus actually believes that crap she said.
Couple that with very poor pacing, side-stories that go absolutely nowhere (hi "Deleter" sub-plot), unbearably boring voice work, lots of plot holes and contrived story explanations (why don't they blow up the Metroid-infected part of the ship from space? And why is the self-destruct for that part of the ship IN THAT SECTION, meaning you HAVE to die, and doesn't have a remote activation somewhere else?) It's bad writing. It's bad game design. It's bad character development.
And that still doesn't bring up the Ridley crying scene, which you MIGHT justify if you've read an obscure Japanese-only manga (that has plot holes of its own), but even then it's a scene that drags on and deprives players of any sort of context. The lack of context itself hurts that scene, and the entire game.
Look, let's face the facts here; Other M isn't a bad game, but it is a bad Metroid game. Despite what you've said, sales charts still peg it as the lowest selling Metroid game in years, it has the lowest scores of any Metroid game, fans are divided and it easily has the most hate from new AND long-term fans of any game in the franchise, and even its creator, Sakamoto, himself said in an interview before the game came out that he feels the true strength of Metroid lies in exploration, puzzle-solving, and item finding... but he was pressured into doing a story for "new" players and feels the old gameplay can't hold up (he's WRONG).
Other M is not "misunderstood". You have it wrong. It's the Metroid series itself that Other M misunderstood. It failed to understand the strengths of the prior games, it failed to understand the strengths of gaming's most respectable female icon, it failed to understand the needs and desires of Metroid fans, and it failed to understand the needs and desires of modern gamers in general.
For 25 years, the series has kept true to its virtues and fans loved it. Other M was bold in its changes, but stupid and clumsy in failing to recognize that some things didn't need changing or that some of its changes were detrimental to the experience.
Other M is not misunderstood. Other M is the one that did the misunderstanding.

Good for you for defending a game you like, but I'm afraid I have to disagree. Like the scene with Ridley, he came back so many times and there was at least 15 minutes between his defeat in Super and Zebes exploding, plenty of time for a Pirate to fetch his Kentuky fried remains so Samus shoudn't have a reason to think he was gone for good. She wasn't like this in Prime after Ridley's first defeat.
But again good for you for liking this game. I don't wish to attack someone for things they like, I'm just geting my thoughts across.

Hmm... You actually developed your point about the story "issues" of Other M better than anyone else. Actually, I didn't fell problems with the part where she parts with Adam nor with the sector 3 part. I just felt that the scene where she cries in front of Ridley and then is depicted as a child was very out of sense.
To be honest, I did feel a little annoyed there. I was like "C'mon, you're looking at that thing for the seventh time (if you count the manga), WHY THE HELL ARE YOU STILL CRYING?!". I had that point because I was counting the manga as a cannon to the story. In the manga, Ridley kills Samus's mother and, in a way, kills her father too. So it's obvious that she developed some kind of trauma (so much that later on in the story, she cries the first time she faces Ridley). However, I believe that that was my mistake. If I forget about the manga, then the fact that she was "facing a ghost" becomes something completely understandable and agreeable.
The thing is, maybe you can say that the part where she becomes a kid in front of Ridley might be some reference to the manga (and her trauma). But, it can also come as a metaphore, where the game shows that Samus feels powerless in front of something that doesn't seem to die.
And, I am one that liked the gameplay style of the game a lot!

Nice article. I have to admit I did not notice the game was so much "genre-busting" : I had a lot of fun playing, and the mix never seemed out of place, so it should be a proof the game was well-conceived.
People COMPLAINED she CRIED ? To me, it made her more human and relatable. She essentially lost the last person she considered as "family". Her being able to overcome her pain and fight just after this loss is much more a proof of strength.
She receives order ? Well, first it is from Adam. She respects him and his authority. And though she is independent, she is not an outlaw : so not respecting orders from the Galactic Federation (represented by Adam) could be somewhat "criminal". What she says when she decides to activate her space jump, I took it as a form of humor and it showed she made her decisions alone when she had no restrictions.
For the "hell run"... Yes, maybe something like" the powersuit has a temporary bug" would have been better. But you point the essential : gameplay-wise it was quite good.
And last, Ridley. Once again, you say the most important thing : Samus herself says in the intro that she believes him dead. Gone. For good. Maybe in the other games, she fought him without hesitation because of anger, of revenge, or whatever. In Other M, those feelings were calmed because she thought him dead, and thus she snapped as Ridley came back as a curse, something even death could not defeat. At least, this is my way of seeing it. And still, she fought him after her short nervous breakdown.
The Ridley scene, I think, sums up the problem : she never displayed emotions in past games because it was not or could not be done. If she wasn't seen as a woman when you finished the game, you could almost have been playing with a robot. And some persons say she had no problem fighting Ridley in Metroid or Super Metroid, but there was NO DIALOGUE in those sequences. How can they know her state of mind? Is it ever stated she assumed Ridley was dead at the end of Metroid ? And in the Prime Trilogy, she still is mute. Only Fusion gave a beginning of information about her.
So you are right. People imagined THEIR version of Samus from games with little storytelling and character depiction. Maybe those unsatisfied should make a petition for "Metroid : the cold, ruthless and robotic bounty hunter" with Steven Seagal as Samus...

All I will say is that I personally hold more regard for Other M then Trilogy. My reasons for this are my own and i won't be sharing them. I have tried to do so many times before only to be bombarded by a rain of counterattacks. In the end, I play for me and I don't care what others do or do not approve of; I'm sick of defending my choices when there should be no reason to. What I WILL share however is my opinion on Trilogy in that it bores me... Don't get me wrong though, I enjoy it, but not in the same way as Other M.
That is all.

I apologize if this comes off as insulting as well, but Chris, the tone of sarcasm within your response does insinuate a HIGH level of insult, and is quite shallow when stacked up to an article of this caliber, which goes to extreme lengths in clarifying the misconceptions you bring up.

I'm with you. Other M is one of my favorite games on the Wii without question. The Prime trilogy is great as well but I found that I had my fun, excitement and challenge with Other M. Plus I actually really enjoyed the story and all the different variances of gameplay, I never got bored and just wanted to keep playing. I would honestly rate that game a 10/10 but I have found that I am one of the apparently very few...

[…] Fusion is no exception. However, it was also the first step down the road to what would become the most controversial and misunderstood game in the series. How does Other M’s forebearer hold up 10 years later? […]